At Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx borough, so many jazz enthusiasts want to be buried near the
graves of greats such as Miles Davis and Duke Ellington that the cemetery is developing new plots
to meet the demand.

The cemetery is building about 2,275 burial plots between the grave of Latin music star Celia
Cruz and “Jazz Corner,” the area where musicians Davis, Ellington, Lionel Hampton and Illinois
Jacquet are buried.

“With the history of the Bronx and everybody who is planning ahead, we have a lot of requests to
be close to Miles Davis and Celia Cruz,” said David Ison, executive director of the cemetery.

Pauline Smith, 74, bought a burial plot near Jazz Corner three years ago. She is a jazz lover
and regularly hires jazz musicians to play at parties at her home in New Rochelle.

“The music is in the earth and in the air and in the heavens,” she said. “I love the idea that I
could be continuing my love on the other side.”

This year, the cemetery opened 70 burial plots behind Davis’ grave in Jazz Corner, separate from
the new development, and most of them have been sold.

The complex includes a mausoleum, finished in February, with space for about 275 sets of remains
and a starting price of $6,000 a plot. Four smaller buildings planned for the site don’t have an
estimated completion date.

The 400-acre cemetery, about half the size of Central Park, is also the final resting place of
notables such as journalist Joseph Pulitzer, women’s-rights pioneer Elizabeth Cady Stanton and
composer Irving Berlin.